


I Have A Voice (It Is My Song)

by thatiranianphantom



Series: je t'aime toujours [2]
Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Bughead as parents, Bughead babies, But I love this universe, Dad!Jughead, F/F, F/M, Gen, I have WIPs!, It's the Georgina universe y'all!, Mom!Betty, Physical Disability, Why do I do this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-06
Updated: 2020-10-23
Packaged: 2021-03-04 03:15:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 10,979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24566767
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thatiranianphantom/pseuds/thatiranianphantom
Summary: They were parents now. They were parents to a beautiful little girl, and they were going to figure this out. Only this time, they'd figure it out together.Or, a series of drabbles following up on No One Else Is Singing My Song. The adventures of Betty, Jughead and Georgina continue!
Relationships: Betty Cooper/Jughead Jones, Cheryl Blossom/Toni Topaz, Veronica Lodge/Reggie Mantle
Series: je t'aime toujours [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1775722
Comments: 151
Kudos: 162





	1. i have a voice

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to this drabble series! 
> 
> I really wanted to continue this series, and make it a bit more lighthearted, after putting Bughead through quite the emotional trauma. But realistically, I already have a oneshot series I'm barely keeping up with. So, we have a fluffy drabble series. If you have prompts, I can't make any promises, but definitely send them my way. 
> 
> I have loved reading all your comments, and I hope you enjoy this series as much as I enjoy writing it!

They were in a clear state of mind. 

Really, they insisted.

They were not going to be those people that had a baby and became total zombies. 

Plus, Jughead had said to a dubious Toni, Georgina was seven pounds. Less than a football (nobody objects). She sleeps, she eats, she poops. 

How hard could it  _ possibly _ be to take care of a newborn, if that was all they did? 

* * *

  
Georgina was eight weeks old, one week corrected due to her prematurity, and had been home for two days. Their amazing friends had set up an entire nursery to welcome her, complete with a sign and cake, making Betty burst into tears.

(Though, to be fair, Betty’s emotions had been fairly all over the place. A week ago, she cried for an hour because the hospital cafe was out of vanilla pudding. 

“The  _ only  _ flavor that matters, Jughead! Why even eat?” she had wailed, as a wide-eyed Jughead had patted her back.)

* * *

  
  


And Jughead has been right about one thing. Georgina was very small. However, to compensate for her miniature size, her lungs were  _ quite  _ healthy, something they were quickly acquainted with in her first two days home.

As it turned out, while the baby slept, she did not feel like the same privilege should be extended to her loving parents, a fact she punctuated by waking up screaming with an almost supernatural ability to sense when Betty and Jughead were in any form of repose. 

* * *

  
  


Betty ran to him once, arms outstretched and clutching their red-faced, wailing baby. 

“This,” she sobbed. “Is  _ not  _ a real baby. She is  _ not  _ a real baby, real babies sleep!” 

(He should argue, but on one particularly exhausting night, he had spent moments prodding her, looking for a mute button as one would on an alarm clock.) 

Betty buys five containers of tarragon because she consistently forgets she already bought it, so the tarragon containers increase with every grocery trip. 

* * *

They bicker. Jughead is living with them now, and all other parties have invested in high-quality earplugs. 

“I just feel like you could help, Jug! It’s not exactly easy to be getting up a million times a night,” Betty snaps. 

“But what is the  _ point _ ?” He growls back, forehead resting on his folded arms. “You’re breastfeeding her. I get up, I hand her to you, that’s it!” 

“Well, I feel like I’m taking care of what goes  _ into _ her, so logically -”

“ _ Logically, _ you would clean up what you started.” 

Betty’s mouth falls open, and Veronica, visiting for the day, gapes. 

“This is riveting,” she stage-whispers to Toni and Cheryl. 

Betty’s eyes shine in rage, and she is on the cusp of a pointed retort when a loud cry sounds from the baby monitor. 

She glares daggers at Jughead, and stomps in the direction of the bedroom. 

She’s barely at the hallway before she whirls, fixing him with a scowl.

“Are you coming?” 

He gives a pleading look to Cheryl, who immediately scurries to safety under Toni’s arm. 

Heaving a groan, he rises and follows her towards the bedroom. 

“Of course! If I wasn’t there to hand her to you, the whole system breaks down!” 

* * *

  
  


Georgina cries in the middle of the night, on all the days with names ending with -day. He’s long since stopped trying to keep track of the day, but he tries to get up with her as much as possible, given how much he’s punished by way of silent treatment, for his surly remarks. He’s roused from the sleep he’d been enjoying for an estimated twenty-six minutes (a new record) by Georgina’s wails, and he groans and moves to pick her up, eyes bleary-and half open. 

She must be eating well, because he’s having trouble picking her up. For a human of less than ten pounds, she is feeling surprisingly robust. Distantly, he hears Betty’s indignant moans and guesses the baby’s wails must have woken her up too. 

“Don’t worry, baby,” he yawns. “It’s okay, Daddy’s got you.”

“Jug,” Betty’s voice mumbles. “What are you doing?”

It’s an odd question, because he feels like it should be fairly obvious after doing it approximately eleven thousand times a night. 

“I’m picking up the baby,” he grunts. 

“No,” she replies, and he swears he hears an extremely tired laugh in her voice. “No, you’re actually picking up me.” 

(Years later, he has decidedly not lived that one down, and it never fails to get a laugh from any audience.) 

* * *

  
  


Their friends start keeping a tally of places they’ve fallen asleep. Jughead, fully clothed in the shower. Betty, in the car, pulled over to the side of the highway. Jughead, standing up mid-listening to something his professor was telling him. Betty, torso up on the floor, legs and feet on the couch. Jughead, head lolling onto Cheryl’s shoulder, mouth open. 

(Veronica swears she’s never seen Cheryl change clothes so fast.) 

* * *

  
  


So, they care for their daughter. And sleepiness aside, sometimes Jughead looks at her, and he just...can’t believe it. Can’t believe that this tiny, profoundly perfect thing was half him. Sometimes she winds her tiny fingers around his and he feels it right down to his bones. 

He’s crying before he realizes it, and vowing that he will always,  _ always _ protect her. It’s an instinct that is hard to describe, but his heart belongs to his daughter now, his beautiful, perfect Georgina.

  
And Betty...look, he loved Betty before. She was the centre of his world since he was five years old, but now it’s...more. It’s deeper. Sometimes Georgina falls asleep on top of Betty, then Betty falls asleep on top of him, and he is a kind of bone-aching exhausted that was heretofore unknown, but he stares at them instead of sleeping, heart full to the point of bursting. 


	2. simple and clear

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just this morning. It seemed like such a simpler time. 
> 
> Now, the minutes melt away before she knows she has to hand her baby away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, I get to take inspiration from Reba! I love it.  
> Thank you all so much for your comments! This is much lighter and fluffier, I know. I am trying to expand my horizons past just angst.

Betty breathes in and out, feeling her little girl’s warm breaths against her neck. 

The tears slip out against her will, even as she tries her hardest to compose herself, and wet her tiny girl’s fuzzy sleeper. Betty had dressed her in that sleeper just this morning, one with tiny cartoon snakes all over it, a gift from Alice and FP. Her baby had smiled at her, and everything inside Betty had lit up.

Just this morning. It seemed like such a simpler time. 

Now, the minutes melt together before she knows she has to hand her baby away. 

* * *

  
  


Jughead stands next to her, rubbing his hand up and down her back. She has to let him say goodbye too, she knows. They both have to let go, have to be strong. It’s for the best. 

Betty sniffles, pressing her lips into Georgina’s head, inhaling the sweet baby scent. 

“I wouldn’t be doing this if I didn’t love you,” she says, her voice trembling.

Georgina wiggles a bit, settling into her mother’s chest. She’s warm and soft, and Betty loves her. She’s never loved anything like she loves her baby, right from the first plus sign on the pregnancy test. 

  
She heaves a shaking breath out. 

“Mommy has to do this, but I love you so much.”

Before she can second guess it, she passes the baby to her father. 

Jughead holds the baby to him, one hand on her tiny head, one under her bottom. He breathes her in, and Cheryl sees actual tears in his eyes. 

Gently, he sways back and forth, muttering to his daughter. 

“Daddy’s sorry, baby girl. I love you. I’m sorry I have to do this. Daddy will miss you so, so much.”

Betty sees tears in his eyes too, so she wraps one arm around his waist, and one around their daughter. Jughead slips an arm around her waist too, and they stare at their tiny Georgina together, laying occasional kisses on her soft skin. 

* * *

It’s moments or perhaps days later that they finally disentangle, and look up at Toni and Cheryl, who are waiting for them. 

To put it mildly, they do not look terrifically sympathetic. 

“Betty, dear,” Cheryl sighs. “You’re leaving the baby in her own home, for two hours, while you go to class, with someone who has known her since birth. You’re not shipping out to war. You’re not facing a firing squad. You’ll probably be back before her nap ends.” 

“But she’s so small,” Betty wails. “And so fragile. She needs me.” 

“And she will have you. But right now, she’s going to spend some time with her aunties, discussing the dangers of inheriting the Jones fashion sense.”

She holds her arms out for the baby, fingers wiggling expectantly. She’s good with the baby, Betty knows. She’ll be fine. She’ll feed her, change her, put her down for a nap, and then Betty will be back. It’s only two hours.

But it’s a whole two hours. Longer than she’s ever spent with both her and Jughead away from the baby. 

(Jughead glares at Cheryl, but does, extremely reluctantly, hand the baby over to her.)

“Watch her head,” he whispers loudly. 

Cheryl matches his glare, and takes Georgina carefully in her arms. “Believe it or not, I’ve held a baby before, Hobo.” 

“Yeah, but this is _my_ baby.”

“Held your baby before too.” 

“ _Okay_ ,” Toni soothes, stepping in between them. “I think it’s time for Betty and Jughead to leave. Guys, the baby will be fine. We’ll see you after class.”

Jughead tugs on her hand, and she gets as far as the door, before Georgina sighs in her sleep and the sound goes right to Betty’s core.

She shakes her head firmly, heading back towards the baby with a glint of determination. 

“No, no, this is a mistake. I should stay.” 

Toni smoothly puts herself in between Betty and the baby. “Betty, I know you want to stay. But you need to leave.”

“But -” 

“No, you’ve missed enough and you need to go. The baby will be fine, and you can’t keep her beside you for the rest of your life. Besides...outside air? Sunshine? Get to walk somewhere with your guy that does not sell diapers? Could be fun.” 

Jughead lets out a huff. “I’ll have you know, Topaz, that Safeway is an incredibly romantic date for new parents who are too tired to do something with any more effort than walking.” 

Toni doesn’t even dignify it with a response before pushing them to the door. 

“Just _go._ Don’t talk about the baby, don’t think about the baby, don’t even say the word _baby._ ” 

She gets them all the way to the door, before they turn around and Betty has tears rolling down her cheeks. 

Toni heaves a sigh that she hopes doesn’t communicate how frustrating this is all becoming.   
  


“What’s with the tears?”

Betty sniffles and grabs Jughead by the hand. “I miss my baby.” 

* * *

  
  


Betty had left enough pumped milk to last the baby through the apocalypse, Cheryl was sure. There was also an itemized list of Georgina’s daily routine, down to five minute increments. Then, there was the contingency plan, which included, but was not limited to: earthquakes, arson, and serial killers.

(Cheryl had objected to that last one, but Betty had fixed her with a look and muttered “with both of our histories, Cheryl? It seemed prudent to add.”

Also, Cheryl and Toni were pretty sure if that last one did come to fruition, their own safety over Georgina’s would never even cross Betty’s mind.) 

Betty calls once from the subway, once before class starts, and sends sixteen text messages to Cheryl and Toni during class. 

After the eight, Toni responds “will tell you if baby on fire. No flames of current, but extinguisher at the ready. Pay attention in class.” 

(It’s followed by four texts in caps, but Toni doesn’t read them). 

* * *

  
  


As soon as Betty gets home, she sweeps the baby into her arms, cuddling her and kissing her all over, but she looks a bit lighter. 

Next time, it only takes 45 minutes for her to surrender the baby. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come say hi on tumblr!
> 
> thatiranianphantom dot tumblr dot com. I post sneak peeks of all my fics!


	3. it speaks the truth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It started with a cold, and likely, that was all it was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You know, I wrote this, read it over, and bam. You're getting it. It's 1am and I have work tomorrow. What am I doing with my life.

It started with a cold, and likely, that was all it was. Georgina came home at eight weeks old, tiny but relatively healthy.

Well, healthy except for the hypotonia. And the muscle spasms. And the feeding difficulties. He tried his hardest, on a daily basis, not to think about what those symptoms could be indicative of, especially in conjunction. 

  
Nonetheless, Georgina Jones was a fairly healthy baby, until about two months after she got home. Then, it started with a sniffle. That, he had read, was not uncommon. It was coming on wintertime. It was cold outside. Babies get sniffles. Not a big deal.

Until the sniffle turned into crying, and her body burning through her sleeper as he picked her up. 

That one got her a hospital trip. 

  
  


* * *

Just a cold, they’d said. But it was the first time they’d been back in the hospital since Georgina was discharged. She squirmed on the paper of the exam table, crying. Like she did in that tiny incubator, with paper-thin skin and tubes coming out of her body. 

And being at the hospital, being back there, it just sent it all rushing back. 

Back to being the parents of a sick baby. Of a baby whose future was uncertain, not promised. Being the object of stares, of pity, of hearing his baby wail and not being able to  _ do _ anything. Being as useless as he was at her birth. 

He’s read about trauma, and PTSD. And Georgina’s birth was traumatic, nobody could deny. But he had thought he was past it. He should have been. He had a beautiful baby, a gorgeous girlfriend, and great friends. Life was great, until he heard the paper of the exam room table crackle, and then he’s back where he started. 

And in that moment, he can stand it no longer, so he scoops his baby up, clad in only her diaper, holding her heated body to his. 

“It’s okay, baby,” he soothes. “Daddy’s here, Daddy’s got you. Everything’s fine.” 

The doctor looks at him with a sympathetic expression, and Betty squeezes his hand.

“Just a cold,” the doctor reiterates. It wasn’t serious. Would be gone in a few days. 

But his baby’s tiny hands cling to him, and the decision is made there and then.

He’s her father. He will protect her.

* * *

  
  
  


Cheryl tries to hold the baby and is unceremoniously rebuked. 

Betty  _ gets _ to hold her but once, while he is showering, something he does in record time. He holds the baby while eating, while brushing his teeth, while answering emails, and it’s a 50 minute fight to get him to lay her down in the crib. 

He assures Betty he’ll turn on her music and join her in their bed, so she gives his arm a soft squeeze, gives the baby a kiss, and leaves. 

It’s when she wakes up the next morning that she realizes he never made it to bed.

No, he’s still lying on the floor of the nursery, one hand in the crib on the baby’s back, sound asleep and drooling. 

“So sexy,” she mutters sarcastically, before leaning down to pass a hand through his hair. “Honey? Time to get up.” 

He wakes like a soldier on command, and she snatches the baby up before he can. 

  
Pressing her lips to Georgina’s forehead, she lets out a hum. “A little cooler. She’s on the road to recovery.” 

Jughead sits up slowly, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. “I guess I...fell asleep.”

Betty smiles and kisses his forehead. “I know you’re worried. But she’s getting better. And you still need sleep. Promise me, tonight you’ll come to bed like a normal person?”

He nods, and he really intends on it.

But that night, he finds the batteries in her nightlight have gone out. So he tells Betty to go to bed, that he’ll change them and be there with her in just a few minutes. 

And the next morning, he’s sleeping on the floor, her baby blanket pillowing his head. 

The next day, he says he needs to check the carbon monoxide detector, that he thinks he saw a blinking light, and that wasn’t safe for a nursery. And don’t worry about getting up tonight, he assures her. She’s taking a bottle well, and he can feed her. She needs sleep anyway. 

And the next morning, there he is on the floor, hand on the baby’s back, and looking more haggard than she’s ever seen him.

(She knows she’s not the only one who thinks this, because Cheryl makes no secret of telling him that he looks like Billie Armstrong circa 2004.) 

It’s been three days, and this time, she refuses to go to bed until he is confirmedly in bed with her. That takes half an hour of convincing, and several false alarms, but he does it. 

So it’s a bit of a shock when the next morning, she wakes to find his half of the bed empty and him sitting up against the crib, hair askew and pronounced bags under his eyes.

* * *

Georgina’s fever breaks on that day, and her body cools. She coos again, and falls asleep against Betty after taking her bottle. Good signs all around, but Jughead still slips out of the bed for the next three nights after she’s asleep.

A week after the baby first fell sick, she wakes in the wee hours of the morning to the baby’s hungry cries, and finds Jughead on the floor of the nursery yet again. 

“Baby,” she sighs. “Her fever is gone. The danger has passed. How are you still here?” 

He shrugs. “I needed to see her breathing.” 

Betty lifts Georgina from the crib and begins feeding her. “We have a baby monitor, you know.” 

“I know. But I feel like if I’m there, she’s...safe. Like I’m fulfilling my promise to not let anything happen to her.” 

The words strike Betty, and she leans into him, giving him a gentle kiss. 

“Juggie, you’re a great dad.”

He looks down with a shake of his head. 

“No, really. You’re a great dad, and she is so lucky to have you. And I know, what we’ve been through with her, it hasn’t been easy. So I get it.” 

She places her fingers under his chin and lifts his face to meet hers. “But you need to remember as well, it’s over. She’s here, and she’s healthy.”

He nods slowly. “I know.”

She lays a head on his shoulder. “I know you do. Sometimes it feels insane that she’s here.” 

“Yeah. Feels a bit too lucky to be happening to us.” 

Betty gives a chuckle. “I’m fairly certain that’s the Riverdale mindset.” 

There’s a long pause. “Maybe we should get her one of those monitoring socks things. It may make you feel better.” 

He nods. “Maybe. If I know she’s okay.”

Betty rises slowly to lay the baby back in the crib. 

“I’ll check into that tomorrow. In the meantime, look at her.” 

They both cast their eyes on their sleeping baby, the lines of her chubby face, the soft black hair. 

And in the morning, Cheryl finds both of them, lying in each other’s arms, on the nursery floor, fast asleep. 

  
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> True story, I found a video of the real Georgina while I was writing this, and, well. There may have been tears. I miss her.


	4. for all to hear

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's not like he didn't notice she was different.
> 
> It's just that to him, she was perfect. 
> 
> (Georgina Cooper-Jones and how she changes one Reggie Mantle.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look, it's the chapter literally nobody asked for! 
> 
> But, you know. Cute. 
> 
> And we get to jump forward a bit! Going forward, this will jump all over this timeline a bit. I'll try to make it clear that we're flashing forward, though! 
> 
> Also, I love Reggie. One of the many characters that does not get enough screen time.

  
  


He’d come back into their lives on the simultaneous best and worst day of their lives. Ronnie calls him in a panic - he suspects because she can’t call Archie, and they’ve had coffee a few times, now that they’re both in New York City. 

It’s a bigger life than Reggie is used to, but he’s come to like it. 

On that day, though, he hates it.

* * *

Contrary to popular belief, he never hated Jughead. He was, in no small part, intimidated by him. By his intelligence, his nonchalance, his competence. None of those things had ever been ascribed to Reggie Mantle. So maybe he was even a bit jealous. 

And then he got with Betty, and he was most definitely jealous. Not for the reasons people would think, though. Cooper had always been a bit straight-laced for him. She’d never taken his shit, not since kindergarten, when he tried to push her off the slide, and she wrestled him to the ground. 

No, he was jealous of their relationship. For all its ups and downs, the love Betty and Jughead shared was the purest he had seen. There was no question, there was no back and forth, they just...loved each other.  _ That  _ was something he was jealous of. Something he’d wanted, something he’d thought he’d found, but never managed to hang onto. 

And when he’s called to the hospital, and Jughead stumbles out of the operating room, there’s a look in his eyes that Reggie hasn’t seen in anyone, ever. 

He looks simultaneously broken and terrified. Reggie remembers that look, even now. He’s gasping something out about Betty and the baby, before collapsing, boneless, to the floor. Reggie takes him to a chair, helps change his bloody clothes, but the look in Jughead’s eyes frightens him. 

* * *

He only looks marginally better when Betty wakes up, but when they see him, he’s still clinging to her, as if she could disappear at any minute. 

She runs her fingers through his hair, still weak, looks him in the eye, tells him “I’m okay, Juggie,” in the softest tone he has heard her use. They hold each other like lift rafts, and Reggie wants that. 

Being close to people, seeing that kind of devotion up close, feels odd to him still. He’s never really bonded with anyone, until them. 

Until Georgina. 

* * *

She’s his niece from the first time they call him to babysit. 

(He’s clearly their last choice, and they’re clearly desperate, but he’s still flattered.) 

She cries for the first two hours. He’s desperate, but he refuses to call Betty and Jughead on principle.

He finally gets food into her in the third hour. She throws up all over his expensive shirt, so he strips it. 

He’s more than a bit frustrated and overwhelmed, but then she falls asleep on his bare chest. Her tiny mouth hangs open, her body sunk into him, and he’s spellbound. 

It’s probably less than 15 minutes later that she wakes, but he’s hooked. 

He smacks a squeaking toy on the ground, and she lets out the purest giggle he’s ever heard. He does it over and over, they make a mess out of all of her toys, and fall asleep while he narrates the night’s hockey game to her. 

(“Now, whatever you do, you never support the Habs. Leafs are where it’s at, no exceptions.”) 

* * *

  
  


From then on, he’s Uncle Reggie, and it’s a name he takes more pride in than any he’s ever worn.

She’s his G-Girl. 

(Jughead groans at the name, but Reggie insists he has no space to say anything.)

He brings her toys, and takes her out for the day, and sometimes they have to remind him that she’s asleep when he drops by unannounced. 

He makes her parents promise to make him first on the babysitter call list (he has some stiff competition for this, but he’s not above bribery). He reminds them that if ever they were to give her a sibling, she’s staying with Uncle Reggie when they got to the hospital.

Once he accidentally drops a can on his toe while he’s watching her, and proclaims “ _ shit _ .” 

She’s so smart, and he’d always known it, but it’s never proven more clearly than when she gleefully spends the next few days going around to her parents, aunts and uncles and squealing “shit!” 

She says his name when she’s 18 months old. Well, kind of. She says what sounds like “Urgie”, but he takes it with pride.

* * *

It’s not like he never noticed that she was different. Granted, he doesn’t know a lot about babies, but he sees her struggle to lift her head. He notices how her ankles curve in. He observes her learning to walk in a gait trainer, feet straightened in plastic contraptions.

It’s just that sometimes she cries when they put them on, and he hates to see her cry. It’s just that he can zip her around in her wheelchair and hear her giggle, instead of taking her to physical therapy to hear her cry and sometimes struggle. 

It’s just that to him, she’s perfect, exactly as she is.

He knows her parents feel the same, the kid lucked out in parents. But he’s her Uncle Reggie. He’s Uncle Yes. The one who she can come to with anything in her life, and whose answer will always be yes.

And this extends to the time where she’s five years old, and they won’t let her play in the kindergarten basketball team. 

He’d pulled it out of her in the stumbling, adorable fashion in which she spoke. Her cheeks flame, she’s embarrassed, but she wanted to an “aleet” (he assumes athlete) like Uncle Reggie, and they won’t let her play, because she’s too slow, and she walks with a gait trainer. 

He sees red. He sees red, and he’s marching over to the school before Georgina’s own father can stop him.

(As it turns out later, Jughead doesn’t stop him, he joins him. For a moment, he stops and lays a hand on the shoulder of the man he used to hate. 

“ _ Christ _ , Jug.” He says, and they both know what it means.

Someone else sees her the way he fears the rest of the world will. As different. As broken. Not as the perfect being she is. As a hindrance, not a joy.) 

He prefers the term  _ complains strongly _ but some may perceive it as yelling. 

It doesn’t matter, though. 

They put Georgina in the game, and kids are the most pure beings he’s seen, because they pass her the ball in her wheelchair, and she throws it up to the net. It goes nowhere near, but they all cheer like she’s won a congressional medal of honor, and she beams. 

* * *

It’s Betty who says it first. 

“You’d be a good dad,” she says. 

It’s a throwaway comment at best, but it sticks with him. 

A dad. Like he never had. Someone who will stick by his kid to the end, support them,  _ love  _ them.

There’s this thing that Betty, Jughead and Georgina have. He sees it sometimes, during the many, many hours he spends with them. Maybe he spends these hours with them because of that. Because when he goes home, it’s quiet and empty. He’s beholden to nobody, and that didn’t used to suck as much as it does.

But the Cooper/Jones family, there’s this quiet love running under all their interactions. It’s there when Betty comes in from work, and the first thing she does is kiss Jughead and Georgina. It’s there when Jughead returns from a lecture, and the baby squeals  _ daddy _ , and he lifts her up and swings her around until she giggles. It’s there when they do movie night, curled on the couch with Betty pressed against Jughead and Georgina pressed against her. 

It’s this warmth, it’s this love, that he seeks. 

That, and Betty’s comment, take him all the way to the adoption agency, and his love for his perfect G-Girl has him ask for the special needs program, in specific. 

* * *

Three months later, they send him a baby boy. He’s newly diagnosed with Cerebral Palsy and Failure to Thrive. He’s the tiniest thing Reggie has ever seen, and he’s terrified. 

He doesn’t even remember calling them, but somehow, a group of people descends on his apartment. They set up a crib and they make a feeding and sleeping schedule. Betty helps him learn to tip the boy up when he eats, and Jughead teaches him a massage technique to stretch his wilting muscles. 

It’s new and it’s scary, and it’s wonderful.

* * *

Three months into Gabriel being placed with him, he leaves the baby with Betty, Jughead and Georgina for a few hours. Ronnie had invited him out for coffee. He wants to go, but letting go of Gabriel is tough. He’s created a laminated schedule that he gives to the people who spend nearly every day with him and Gabriel (to their credit, they don’t laugh). He spends nearly an hour working up the courage to hand him over to Betty. 

“Come  _ on _ , Reg,” Jughead moans. “Even I wasn’t this bad when we left Georgina for the first time.” 

(That’s met with scoffs. Jughead looks genuinely shocked and Cheryl takes the time to remind him that they actually looked awfully like a couple about to ship out to war when they said goodbye to Georgina the first time.) 

He manages eventually, but before he leaves, he reaches down and gives his G-Girl, the inspiration of his life, a high five. 

Maybe they won’t be Betty and Jughead exactly, but where that family has led his life is something Reggie will be grateful for forever. 

  
  
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The real Georgina will turn 12 soon. Miss you, my girl.


	5. it gives me hope

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She is twenty months, four days, and six hours old when the world changes. 
> 
> Or maybe the world stays exactly the same, but to them, it’s like being blasted into a whole different universe.
> 
> A universe changed by two words. By one sentence. 
> 
> I’m comfortable making a diagnosis of Cerebral Palsy. 
> 
> OR: Georgina is diagnosed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As I said in my last fic:
> 
> I'm back, babydoll! 
> 
> It's been a few months. Were we ever not in quarantine? Time has lost all meaning. In Canada, we've moved into Phase 3, so gyms and indoor dining is reopening. We're all a bit cautious, and most of us think it's too soon. But anyhow. #2020. 
> 
> Anyway, this one was written but feels kind of...meh. I feel like I wanted to convey something important but I don't know how well it came across. 
> 
> But also, we remember that CP is a wide spectrum. And even if it weren't, people with CP are just as important as people without it. 
> 
> The comments on this have been lovely. I am happy to be representing something that doesn't get talked about in fanfiction a lot. 
> 
> Be safe, everyone! See you next time :)

She is twenty months, four days, and six hours old when the world changes. 

Or maybe the world stays exactly the same, but to them, it’s like being blasted into a whole different universe.

A universe changed by two words. By one sentence. 

_ I’m comfortable making a diagnosis of Cerebral Palsy.  _

* * *

It’s not like they didn’t see it coming. Georgina struggled to hold her head up; her eye gaze was sometimes off; her movements could be stiff. She walked, but it was a wobbly, unbalanced sort of walk. Her limbs trembled. Sometimes she walked into walls. 

  
  


And then there was that one line, scribbled on one of her first charts, all those months ago. 

_ High risk for ataxic cerebral palsy.  _

  
  


When the doctor asked her to come in for motor tests, when his carefully measured face took in her struggling to move, they knew what it meant. 

But suddenly, they were officially, undoubtedly, the parents of a special needs child. Suddenly there were prescriptions for glasses and walkers and wheelchairs, and he just wants them to  _ stop _ for a minute. Stop and let him  _ process _ . Stop and look at his tiny girl who greeted him this morning with a bright smile and wiggling fingers and a chorus of “da da da da.” 

For that day, in that doctor’s office, he is violently slammed back twenty months, back to the NICU. 

Betty cries, just like then. He holds her, just like then, back then when in an instant, he was not only a father, but a special needs father.

He holds his child, breathes in her sweet baby scent, cherishes her sinking her tiny body into him, and tries to close his mind off to this new world they are entering. 

Realistically, he knows she needs this label. She needs it for wheelchair services, and school accommodations, and therapies. 

But that doesn’t mean he wants it. He doesn’t want his child labeled. 

  
  


He promised it then, he promises it now. 

_ I’m her father. I will protect her. _

* * *

Their faces give it away instantly. 

Their friends had expected it too, he knows. They had never managed to move out. They had the means; they had the opportunity. But their friends were both an extended family and built-in babysitters. And for two twenty-one year olds in college raising a child? Staying is the smart thing. 

If time travel were ever invented, he would relish the opportunity to go back and tell his past self that one day, he would be voluntarily living with Cheryl Blossom. 

Their friends love Georgina too. They could not be more her aunts and uncles if they were actually related to her. Even Archie has come back into their lives. He doesn’t live in New York, but he visits fairly frequently. It’s no longer awkward, but it’s not the same. Still, he enjoys having his oldest friend back in his life. Veronica hasn’t yet come around to that, especially with Reggie in the picture, but they’re civil. It’s fine. 

* * *

They all love Georgina. She is special to all of them. So when Betty and Jughead get home, all of their friends are waiting on the couch, scrutinizing their faces for a sign. They want to know what the doctor said too, but Jughead doesn’t think he has it in him to tell them. 

As it turns out, he doesn’t have to. 

Because, again, their faces say it all. 

Veronica and Cheryl try to hide it, but they cry. Reggie and Kevin and Archie’s faces fall, their heads falling into their hands. Toni loops her arms around Cheryl, her breath coming in a sad sigh. 

And Betty, the strongest person he has ever met, she just looks numb. 

She sits with a sleeping Georgina on the couch, cradling her, nose in her child’s hair, and humming a lullaby. 

He slips an arm around her. 

“Betty,” he chokes out. “I’m sorry.” 

He is. He is forever sorry for the way Georgina came into the world. He hardly dares think about it most of the time. The screaming, the crying, the blood, the flatline of the heart monitor….he’d thought it was because of him. He’d yelled at Betty, treated her terribly, and then their daughter went still inside of her. 

He hasn’t blamed himself in a long time. But today, today feels different. 

Betty knows what he’s thinking; she always does. She squeezes his hand. “ _ No _ , Jug. Don’t go there. This isn’t on you. You know that.”

There’s silence, and then, of all people, Reggie Mantle speaks. 

“This doesn’t...change anything,” he says. 

They all swing their gaze toward him, but he doesn’t look away. His eyes are bright and determined, looking at the sleeping girl in Betty’s arms. 

“I mean it. She’s still our...she’s still our G-Girl. Who cares what some doctor says? It doesn’t change her. She’s still perfect.” 

* * *

It sticks with Jughead, even hours later. 

It sticks with him all night, and it materializes long after Betty is asleep, her arms wrapped around him and their daughter. 

It materializes when he’s rocking his girls to sleep, and it’s a balm over the wound of the day. 

The Georgina he holds in his arms today is the same Georgina he held yesterday. She is no less perfect today, with an extra scribble in her file, than she was yesterday. Cerebral Palsy, it was part of her, but it wasn’t the only part. It didn’t outweigh the way she drew everyone to her. Or the way she links him and Betty together, in a family. Or the way her beloved aunts and uncles adore her. 

She may be different, but her difference is beautiful. She is exactly as perfect now as she ever was. 

Just one part of what made her  _ theirs _ . 

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> According to Grammarly, this chapter has a "confident" feel. I don't...really know what to do with that.


	6. it gives me faith

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jughead Jones becomes a father at nineteen. 
> 
> Young, most would say. It is young. He’s a college student. He worried one minute about paying back loans and what grade he got on his midterm, and the next moment, his daughter is fighting for her life in an incubator, six weeks early. 
> 
> His daughter. 
> 
> It still fills him up to the brim with a feeling that’s hard to define. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think we're at the point where I need to state that I had a happy childhood, and I have a good relationship with my parents, so I don't know why I'm like this. 
> 
> Look at me, angstin' up even my fluff fics. 
> 
> Anyway. I got nominated, with this series, for the 7th Bughead Awards! If you nominated me, thank you so so much! I am honored!

Jughead Jones becomes a father at nineteen. 

Young, most would say. It is young. He’s a college student. He worried one minute about paying back loans and what grade he got on his midterm, and the next moment, his daughter is fighting for her life in an incubator, six weeks early. 

His daughter. 

It still fills him up to the brim with a feeling that’s hard to define. 

* * *

He is not the only young father in the world. Far from it. Betty makes him join a support group a few months after Georgina’s birth for young fathers. Some of them are painfully young, one just barely fifteen. At fifteen he hadn’t even kissed Betty, so he can’t even imagine being responsible for a baby then. But the group fills him with a sense of camaraderie. It’s a nice break from his original group of friends. In many ways, he and the other young dads are alike. But there’s one significant way they’re different. 

He becomes a father twice.

Once, when he finds out his baby exists. When he yells at Betty, tells her he hates her, then goes home, lies on his bed, and tries in vain to wrap his head around the fact that he’s going to be a father. 

But he’s not, not really. 

Because then, Pete and Katherine enter. His baby’s parents. 

They’re there, and then Georgina is born, and he doesn’t allow himself to remember too much of that day. 

But when it ends, Pete and Katherine are gone, and he becomes a father for the second time. 

Only this time, it’s forever. 

Looking back on that now, he wouldn’t want it any other way.

* * *

Their baby completes them. She is the sun, the moon, and the stars. 

She’s fourteen months old. She can’t walk yet, can barely bear weight on her bent little legs, but she’s absolutely perfect. 

She struggles with feeding issues, so she’s small, but that just makes it easier for him to toss her in the air and hear her sweet giggle. 

She can’t really talk, but that just makes her squawks of “da!” so much more profound as she greets him at the end of the day.

He falls asleep with Betty’s head resting on his chest and their baby tucked into his arm, and it’s not perfect but it’s pretty damn close. 

* * *

They’re still nineteen-year-old parents to a special needs child, though. It comes with no small amount of stress. Stress he’s happy to bear, but stress nonetheless. It’s been a particularly stressful day and he’s sure it shows on his face as he carries his baby home at the day.

He doesn’t really have room for any more stress, but that is thrown out the window when he sees none other than Pete and Katherine, nervously waiting outside his door.

To say he’s shocked is a dramatic understatement. 

He shifts Georgina to the other arm, hiding her sleeping face against him. Pete and Katherine don’t take their eyes off him, and he feels Betty tense next to him. 

The silence is palpable for long moments, until Betty finally speaks.

“Pete. Katherine. What are you doing here?”

They stutter for a few moments, something about how they hope this isn’t an invasion, and they wouldn’t have come, but they felt they  _ had _ to, they’d been thinking about Betty and Jughead.

Jughead would be hard-pressed to think of the last time he’s thought about them after Georgina’s birth. 

There’s something about their words, limited as they are, that throws him. They try to step a little closer to him, to the baby, and he steps noticeably back. 

Betty winds an arm around him, relaxing him a bit, but he doesn’t fully understand this need he has to take his love and his baby and run. 

They say they’re sorry, that they panicked, that it was a mistake. 

It was a mistake for them, to be sure. He likes to think it worked out quite well for him. 

They ask how Betty and Jughead are doing. Tired, they reply, but good. They provide Pete and Katherine with the scantest of details on their lives. They’re in college, and they have support, Georgina is in therapy and doing well.

In turn, Pete and Katherine tell them that they have never stopped thinking about their baby. 

(He holds her a little tighter at that. She’s  _ his _ . Well,  _ theirs _ . His and Betty’s. That is something that will never change.) 

They tell Betty and Jughead that they haven’t adopted another baby. Jughead is glad. They aren’t ready to be parents, clearly. 

And then...and then they ask to see the baby. 

He knows Betty feels it too. They recoil, they say no, and they ask Pete and Katherine to leave. How dare they, he thinks. They abandoned this baby. They don’t get to come back. They don’t deserve it.

They run inside, shut the door and his shaking hands barely manage to pass the baby to Cheryl before Betty is in his arms, fingers clutching at his shirt.

He soothes her and runs a hand up and down her back, but he doesn’t feel comforted. 

* * *

They get the paperwork the next day. Betty picks it up, and he comes running on her wail. 

Reggie runs to grab the baby, and he holds Betty against him. 

They’re suing for custody. Pete and Katherine want to take their baby. 

Nothing has prepared him for this. 

Nothing has prepared him to hold a sobbing Betty against him, to press his baby against him until she squeaks in protest, to have the prospect of their entire lives ripped from them. 

* * *

There’s only one lawyer they trust, and she’s their first call. 

There’s a trial scheduled.

“They don’t have a case,” Archie’s mom assures them. “The trial is probably just a formality.” 

Probably.

He’s not willing to stake his entire family on  _ probably _ . 

* * *

He cried once, after he found out. 

When he found out he was going to be a father at nineteen. He was so young, what the hell did he know about being a father? Surely, this was the end for him. There goes his life.

Now, his life lies in Betty’s arms, asleep, breathing softly. His life has red cheeks and blonde curls and calls him “dada” in the sweetest, tiniest voice in the world, and he isn’t sure how he breathed without her. 

Betty cries and hangs on to the baby, nose into Georgina’s blonde curls. He holds her, and he’s pretty sure he hasn’t breathed since he opened the paperwork. She has visions of police officers and social workers storming their house and ripping her baby from her arms. 

He wants to tell her that’ll never happen, but Mrs. Andrews had said “probably.” 

* * *

Their friends want to help. They all want to help, they agree to testify for them instantaneously. When he goes over the details of the trial, Betty sits ramrod straight. She’ll fight them, he knows this. She’ll fight with everything she has and Pete and Katherine don’t even know what’s coming for them, having Betty Cooper as an opponent. 

Veronica winds a hand into Betty’s, keeping her nails away from her palms, and lays her head on Betty’s shoulder. 

“We’ll fight this, B,” she whispers. “I promise. They’re not taking her.”

He feels like Betty may know this, intellectually. There are few people smarter than his Betty. But she’s no longer just Betty the detective. Now she’s a mother, and like him, their life is their daughter. 

They’ve lost so much in their lives. They won’t lose her. 

* * *

Pete and Katherine have an expensive lawyer. She has dug into their past, and that is not a past that is easily understandable to people outside Riverdale. But they have Mrs. Andrews, who understands, as much as anyone can. She starts off the trial by commenting on the sheer ridiculousness of them being here in the first place. 

“My clients have signed no contract relinquishing their child to the Serranos,” she bites out. “They voluntarily stepped aside when confronted with the prospect of a child with special needs. My clients, however, stepped up to the plate. They are excellent parents, and the child is well cared for. Being here at all is absolutely pointless.”

Their lawyer fires back, though. She accuses them of being irresponsible. She brings up that Betty and Jughead weren’t together during the pregnancy. That Betty was, initially, planning on relinquishing Georgina. That they have a history of instability, and they live in a collective house with their friends. Not the most stable for an infant, the lawyer argues. 

When Betty is on the stand, the Serranos’ lawyer asks her why she said there was no father involved. Betty insists the situation is different now, but the lawyer uses it to paint a picture of an unstable relationship, and he’s worried the jury is buying it. Pete and Katherine are older. They’re stable, they have jobs and money, and Betty and Jughead are just two kids trying to raise a kid. 

Maybe they are, but they will fight like hell for that kid. 

* * *

Mrs. Andrews gives them more information after the day draws to a close, information that will be used in the second and last day of the trial, tomorrow. Pete and Katherine indeed had not adopted another baby. In fact, they had tried twice to, and both times backed out. One, the child was too old (three months old), and they were worried about attachment issues. Second, the birth mother had been using drugs, and they refused a baby that could be born addicted. They had seen Georgina with them a few times, Mary tells them. They think she looks “normal.” 

None of this makes them feel better. Jughead remembered telling them that babies did not come with a guarantee. It’s clear this didn’t sink in. In an odd way, he feels bad for them. They want a baby, they’re desperate. In another life, one where he was not a father, he may feel sympathetic to their plight. But in this life, he  _ is  _ a father and damned if he will let them within a few feet of  _ his  _ child. 

Their friends defend them fiercely. It warms both of them inside to hear all of their friends talk about how stable Georgina’s life is, how supported she is, how loved they all are. People who used to bully him are now his friends. Reggie had, in all seriousness, came to them with a getaway plan if the family needed to disappear. Together with Archie, he had planned for every eventuality and already had a story ready for the police. 

The same Reggie that used to call him “Wednesday Addams” and beat him up in school. How far they’ve all come. 

* * *

Very clearly against their counsel’s advice, the Serranos want to meet with them. Betty and Jughead do  _ not _ want to talk to them, but Mary advises it. 

“Mediation,” she says. “Is always better than a court trial.” 

To their surprise, Pete and Katherine seem to think that they’re doing Betty and Jughead a favor. Betty holds Georgina while they talk, clutching her tightly, hiding her face. The Serranos explain how they are willing to take on Georgina’s care (which they describe as “maybe some small braces” as if that’s the sum total. As if that’s all Georgina is worth. As if they only aim to “fix” her. Jughead wants to be sick. His baby doesn’t need to be fixed. She’s not broken, she fixed them all). They stress that Betty and Jughead are young. They’re college students, and Georgina would hold them back from their future. They’d take her, provide compensation, take over her care. Like a business transaction. Please, they say. They want a baby  _ so  _ much and this could be their last chance. 

Betty’s tenser than she has been in a long time beside him. 

“Go to hell,” she hisses. “There’s no way in hell you’re taking my baby.”

“You wanted to give her to us before,” Pete implores. “You knew we’d take good care of her.” 

Betty leans forward, holding the baby tighter. 

“You  _ abandoned  _ her,” she is trying not to raise her voice, he can tell. “You didn’t even care if I was alive, and you walked out on her!” 

There are tears in Katherine’s eyes. “We were scared!”

“And I wasn’t scared? I almost died, Jughead watched me bleed out, and then I had a premature, sick baby that I was now responsible for raising. But you know what? I did it. I chose to be a mother, and it was the best decision I ever made.” 

Pete reaches out to them, but they both pull back. 

“You abandoned her the second it got hard. Then you did it twice more. You don’t deserve her.”

He can only nod in agreement, and look at Betty in wonder. She is so, so strong. He and Georgina couldn’t be luckier. The Serranos’ words are hollow, and pointless. They won’t give up. He’ll fight till the death for his family, happily. They won’t lose. 

* * *

They win. It’s no surprise, but Betty bursts into tears anyway, and the gallery breaks out in cheers. Their friends pass Georgina around, hold her up in the air and swing her, listening to her giggles. 

Pete and Katherine look devastated. This is the end for them, he knows. They will not be parents, but he can’t bring himself to feel bad. They had their chance. They have only themselves to blame. 

They catch Betty and Jughead on their way out and hesitantly ask if they can still see her. 

“At least visit,” they say tearfully. “We’ve been dreaming about her. We wanted her to be ours so bad.” 

Betty and Jughead don’t even have to look at each other. That’s why they can’t see her, they say. They don’t know what being a parent is. They will not treat their baby like the miracle she is, only as something to be gained, something to be fixed. They’re sorry, in a way, but no. This is goodbye. 

There’s a party afterward, at their house. Veronica swings Betty around, drying her tears and making her laugh. Reggie plants kisses on Georgina’s cheeks, looking palpably relieved. 

“Uncle Reg knew they wouldn’t dare take his G-girl!” he crows. 

The music is fast and pumping, but Betty and Jughead slow dance, Georgina asleep on Betty’s shoulder. 

Jughead idly wonders how he could have  _ ever  _ thought he was giving something up when Georgina was born. He was being given a gift. Now, and forever, she’s theirs. 


	7. it lifts me up

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And then he put her through so much. 
> 
> But as Betty likes to remind him, that’s in the past now. Now, they’re back, and he is in love with his life. He’s in love with the tiny girl that insists on sleeping in their bed every night. He’s in love with the way the room is theirs, right down to the fragments they have saved from his first novel, and framed on the wall. 
> 
> (it's Bughead wedding fluff)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> FLUFF. Just pure fluff. That's probably why I felt so uncomfortable writing it. I'm an angst writer, damnit! 
> 
> Anyway. I hope you enjoy the tooth-rotting fluff!

It’s not as if he’s doubted that this is forever. They spent six months apart, and that was enough. 

But he wishes it had never happened. There’s things he wishes every day that he could have been there for, starting with the test that told Betty their little Georgina was on the way. The early days, the appointments, the bump starting to show, the first time hearing her heartbeat. 

The things he’ll never have, the things he missed. 

It doesn’t so much fill him with anger now, as with sadness. Now, he pictures Betty, all alone, dealing with so much, when he’s not there for her. If anything, he’s angry at himself. He didn’t fight for her, for them. And then he put her through so much. 

But as Betty likes to remind him, that’s in the past now. Now, they’re back, and he is in love with his life. He’s in love with the tiny girl that insists on sleeping in their bed every night. He’s in love with the way the room is  _ theirs _ , right down to the fragments they have saved from his first novel, and framed on the wall. 

_ “A gunshot in July brings together the perfect girl next door and the loner weirdo from the Southside.”  _

* * *

And now that they are together, he never wants to be apart again. He thinks about that, now. He thinks about it all the time. It’s all this feeling, building up inside of him, ready to explode at any minute. 

And it does, at the most predictably inopportune of times. It bursts out as she changes their daughter for the day. Betty lays their girl on the changing table, wiggling her fingers up and down their daughter’s torso and eliciting the sweetest giggles. 

Their baby laughs, and Betty laughs, and Jughead can contain it no longer. 

“Marry me,” he says. 

It is, perhaps, not the best planning he’s ever done. He has no ring, he’s not down on one knee, but somehow it’s still perfect. 

She kisses him softly, in a way that feels like they will spend forever doing it. He knows he has a dopey smile on his face as they pull away, but their daughter takes that opportunity to say “Mama, pants!”

It’s not grand or romantic, but it’s them. 

* * *

Still, he wants more. He tasks Reggie to watch Georgina one night, and he takes her out. It’s summer, just warm enough for an outside picnic, catered by Veronica’s family chef, of course. It reminds him of the time just before they had fallen apart, of their last date to Greendale. In fact, if his calculations are correct, the day Georgina was conceived. 

She counts the ring he slides from his own finger to hers as a “perfect ring, Juggie, I don’t need anything else”, but he did not suffer through ring shopping with Veronica Lodge in vain. That was not an experience he ever cares to repeat, with the square cuts, and the diamond cuts, and the rubies and the opals and the diamonds and the “you’ll know it when you see it, Jughead!” 

In fact, he did know it when he saw it, though. It just said  _ Betty _ to him. Simple, classic and beautiful. 

  
  


* * *

This time, he goes down on one knee. This time, he tells her that he loves her, that he’s always loved her, and that he’ll love her for the rest of his life and then some. This time, he asks for real.

She cries and tackles him to the ground in an embrace, and he slides the ring on shakily. 

That night, it’s just them. The moonlight bounces in their window and off the ring as their bodies entwine together, like their souls. 

* * *

  
  


If Jughead had to look back on the biggest mistake of his life, it would unquestionably be agreeing to let Veronica Lodge and Cheryl Blossom plan their wedding. They had been pretty clear that they wanted a small outdoor wedding at end of summer. Just family and friends. Not a black-tie, catered event. Just them. 

All he really wants is to marry her.

How they get there feels fairly inconsequential.

But suddenly there are cake tastings, and dress fittings, and floral arrangements and centerpieces. 

He dares to protest but once, and the threats that are whispered to him should he not comply turn his stomach. He, a former gang leader, is well and truly intimidated. 

So he’s at the tuxedo fittings, under duress, and he approves meals and floral arrangements (evidently the theme of their wedding is “fairy glen” and the colors are lilac and cream), and they assure him that Betty’s dress is beautiful, but he is never asking them to do anything ever again. 

* * *

  
  


It’s worth it, though. 

It’s so worth it, because the day comes, and there is a delicate wood arch that Pope Tate stands under, and he wears a vest and button-up but negotiates no suit jacket, and good god, Betty looks beautiful. 

Her dress is simple and cream, flared out around the waist. Her hair is down and her makeup is soft, and Jughead is the luckiest person in the world. 

As much as he hates to think about this on his wedding day, he remembers eight-year-old Archie inviting him to he and Betty’s wedding. He remembers kicking at the dirt so hard it flew up in everyone’s faces and not really understanding that impulse. 

Things have certainly changed. 

He’s a writer, he speaks from the heart, but Betty is his heart. He tells her about a five-year-old boy who looked at a little girl with stars in his eyes, stars that shine on to this day. He tells her about how she’s his achor, his muse, the person who gave him everything, as their greatest accomplishment sucks her thumb and strokes Betty’s hair. 

And he unashamedly cries when Betty tells him that through everything they’ve been through, if she’s his achor, he is hers. Her rock, her safest place, her home. Her always. 

* * *

  
  


After the ceremony, Jughead dances with his wife.

It feels like coming home at the end of a long day. He buries his face in her shoulder, and feels her sigh. 

It’s so  _ warm _ . It’s odd, but that’s the best way to describe it. He feels warm all over, and then a tiny body buries itself between them, and the music flows around all three of them.

* * *

_ Three of them _ is perhaps wrong, as he discovers a week later, when his wife pulls him into the bathroom with shaking hands holding a plastic stick. 


	8. it keeps me safe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He barely knows what’s happening, but he’s been fine-tuned throughout the last few years to listen to the women in his life, so when she beckons him to stand by the door, he does. He calls for Betty urgently, and his angel wobbles to the floor on shaky legs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's 2/5 WIPS done!
> 
> That's right, barring inspiration striking me or a really good prompt, I am considering this fic done. I just have so many WIPs and so much going on right now. But the reaction and reception to this has been so lovely! I am so very thrilled that you guys have loved the continuing adventures of Jughead, Betty and Georgina.

He’s never been more thankful for Betty’s crazy work schedule, which puts her home on a random Tuesday during the coldest snap of the winter. 

Their daughter is three, sassy and hilarious, a light in everyone’s life. She’s exhausting but wholly worth it. Her body struggles to keep up with her spirit, but she’s unbeatable. It’s harder to convince people that she can do it on their own, and they have to let her than it is for her to simply pout her little rosebud lips and hitch a ride. 

On this Tuesday, he’s strapping her sparkly blue AFOs onto her feet when, for the first time, she shakes her head. “No, Daddy,” she says, and her thin little arms push with all her might to hoist her off of her toddler bed. 

He barely knows what’s happening, but he’s been fine-tuned throughout the last few years to listen to the women in his life, so when she beckons him to stand by the door, he does. He calls for Betty urgently, and his angel wobbles to the floor on shaky legs. 

Georgina has had therapy since she was six months old. No therapist could give a uniform prediction as to what her gross motor ability would ever be, but he’d sat stiffly through enough therapies ending in tears and abrupt quits. 

(And sometimes Georgina was pretty upset too.) 

But it culminates in this. Betty tears around the corner as they see her put her right foot before her left, then left before right, over and over until their angel is stumbling towards them. Their three-year-old is walking, a beaming smile on her face and they are in tears. 

When she finally tips toward them, Betty grabs her up, pressing her face into the dark hair and shaking with barely controlled sobs. 

She’d have been just as perfect to them if she’d never walked, but she did. 

When he finally gets a turn, he breathes into her neck, again and again. “I’m so proud of you, I love you,” because it’s a feeling that fills him to the brim. 

* * *

  
  


“It’s okay, Daddy,” he’d said, as his father dropped him off, five years old in raggedy clothes and shoes with holes. “I have my book.”

Jughead remembers but one thing about that day, his first day of school. That was the day Betty Cooper came crashing into his life and declared him her best friend. That was the start of everything.

He wonders if his baby will have anything like that. A connection that spans decades, a tether in the world.

Then again, it’s a lot to pin on a five-year-old’s first day of school.

Decidedly, Betty is the calmer one when they register Georgina for her first day of Kindergarten. He has long moved past unjustified shame when filling out the paperwork detailing special accommodations needed. 

Collectively, Betty and Georgina are far more excited than him. She’s just so small. She’s not ready. She’s still a baby, one hand in his and one hand on her walker. And he knows, when she lets go, she never really comes back. Betty tells him he’s being overdramatic (he’s a writer. It’s in his nature), but he knows well, once this tiny step to independence is complete, she’ll never come back to him quite the same. 

And that’s good. It is. Her being independent, it means they’ve done their job. 

Still, he holds her hand tightly in his until the bell rings. Betty swoops down to give her a tight hug and kiss, and then she looks up at him. 

“Okay, Daddy,” she says. “You can let go.” 

* * *

  
  


He doesn’t sing. This is well known about him. He steers well clear of the musical numbers that seem to be oddly plentiful in Riverdale. He’s got favorite bands, sure, but he’s no singer. 

Betty has a beautiful voice. She’s happy taking up that mantle for both of them. Georgina loves it when Betty sings to her. She calms instantly, and he can see why. Betty calms him too. 

But Betty’s out for the night, and Georgina is crying. He’s tried it all, absolutely everything he can think of, and still, her little face is scrunched in a wail. He’s out of options, and frankly, out of his last shred of sanity.

At least, that’s the story he’s sticking with, based on what comes out of his mouth next.

Look, it had been a long time, but some things stick with you, and that is how the Barney the Dinosaur theme song pours out of him. 

The look on his baby’s face kind of says it all. She looks as shocked as him, and he doesn’t think he misses a mildly judgemental quirk of the eyebrows. 

It works, though. The crying stops. That is, it stops as long as he is singing, and Georgina seems in no hurry to go to sleep. 

So he cycles through as much of The Cure, Pink Floyd, and AC/DC as he can remember off the top of his head, and she’s quiet but still awake. 

And then, as he will say in later retellings, things got...weird. 

In the next thirty minutes, out of his mouth comes Backstreet Boys, Spice Girls, some snippets of a My Little Pony song he doesn’t know where he’s picked up, and then he finally manages to soothe her to sleep on Baby Got Back. 

He breathes out a sigh of pure relief, relief that is short-lived when someone softly clears her throat at the door, and his loving girlfriend stands there with a look that is equal parts rage and amusement.

He already knows this story will be told to people, and in the years that follow, he’s never really been able to recover back the dignity Sir Mix-A-Lot stole from him. 

  
  


It’s what she would count as a normal night. Jughead’s out at a meeting, and she’s feeding her four-year-old dinner when Georgina’s plate of spaghetti accidentally drops on the floor, and she hears it. 

“Oh, _ shit _ , Mama!” 

It’s fair to say it gives her pause. She’s pretty sure none of the children at preschool have yet learned words like this, so where her daughter could have heard this is a bit of a mystery. 

“Honey, we don’t say that. That’s a no word,” she says, completely neglecting to remember that there are few things more attractive to a preschooler than a forbidden word. 

She turns back to the stove, and quietly, under her breath, she hears her daughter again. 

“ _ Shit. _ ” 

Whirling around, she faces her red-cheeked daughter. 

“ _ Georgina _ . Mommy told you, that’s a no word, and we don’t say it.”

  
  


To her credit, Georgina doesn’t repeat it. At least, in full view of her mother. 

But she does start hearing it a lot. When Georgina drops a doll in her room. When someone tells her that Daddy may be a bit late. When Betty hits traffic on the way home. 

She’ll groan with frustration, and a gleeful “Shit!” will sound from the backseat. 

There are conversations, long ones, about no-no words, about rude words, about how we don’t say things like that, but for weeks, the word’s appeal seems to be in how forbidden it is. At a certain point, Betty starts picking her battles. 

However, those talks did net a piece of important information, which is why Reggie Mantle finds himself with a milk frother to his neck and a furious Betty demanding to know why he felt his contributions to Georgina’s early childhood needed to be the introduction of profanity. 

* * *

  
  
  


It starts when Jughead slams the door, startling both Betty and Georgina. 

He flops himself down at the kitchen table and is quickly joined by a confused Betty after settling their daughter with a book.

“Juggie…” she ventures. “You don’t look….thrilled.” 

He snorts. “Little overachiever. Thinks he’s just so great, with his ‘advanced motor skills’ and his ‘second-grade reading vocabulary.’ Like that’s anything to be excited about.”

It doesn’t clear anything up for Betty. She slides down across him at the table. 

“Okay, honey, walk me through it.” 

He looks up at her, his eyes alight with rage, and grabs her hand to squeeze. 

“That  _ ass _ downstairs. He was saying all this shit that he could do, that Georgina couldn’t, and it was honestly just...so ridiculous, Betty!  _ Where _ does he get off thinking he’s got anything on our girl?”

Betty shakes her head. As far as she knew, their downstairs neighbor didn’t have a second-grade reading level. At least, she hoped that was the case. 

“Wait, Tom, of Tom and Denise downstairs.”

He looks at her incredulously, as if the scant details he’s offered her should have made his issue obvious, and she’s being purposely dense. 

“No, Betty. Adam.”

Adam. She vaguely recalled an Adam. 

“Wait, Jug, do you mean Adam, their six-year-old?”

He nods furiously. “Little turd was just listing all this shit he could do, and I couldn’t help myself, Betty. I couldn’t let him get away with that, so I had to fight back. I just started saying all this stuff that she’s already done, that he could never  _ dream  _ of, and then he started shouting at me, and I shouted back, and how  _ dare _ he, Betty? Who does he think he is?”

Betty shakes her head, her brain struggling to put the pieces together. “Wait. Jug, are you telling me you got in a shouting match  _ and  _ an accomplishments race with a six-year-old boy?”

He doesn’t really seem to understand her incredulity, and it paints a picture in her head of Jughead furiously extolling his daughter’s accolades to a first grader, with the child shouting right back in his face. 

She brings the family a tray of baked goods the next day and apologizes profusely. She is wholly not backed up by her husband, who glares at the child every time they meet in the hallway for the next few years. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As it always will be, this is for the kids of STO, who changed my life.

**Author's Note:**

> Dedicated, as always, to the children of STO Children's Home in Cameroon, and to the real Georgina. I love you all, I miss you all every single day. Thank you for changing my life. 
> 
> ....I feel like I should say something me-ish to lift the mood back up. 
> 
> Um.....
> 
> Go watch Wynonna Earp. 
> 
> She never blows jobs without a please first.


End file.
